December 2017

CO-OPERATION
FOR THE COMMON GOOD
PLANNING
BY CLIFF MILLS AND
GILLIAN LONERGAN
q The global appeal fund
reached £117,395 thanks
to co-operatives around
the world.
Co-operatives UK’s emergency flood appeal for
funds for co-operative reconstruction in countries
devastated by hurricanes stands within a long
tradition of co-operation supporting those in need.
Among the co-operative archives in Manchester
is a history of the Bury District Co-operative
Society, written to commemorate its jubilee in 1905.
It contains a table of grants made by that society
over its first 50 years.
By 1905 the list, which is added to from year to
year, runs to 17 different causes including hospitals
(Manchester Royal Infirmary and Dispensary,
Bury Dispensary Hospital, Manchester Royal Eye
Hospital, Manchester Ear Hospital); the Bury
Ragged School; the Royal National Lifeboat
Institute, and a range of other local charities and
causes such as the Bury Cinderella Club, the Poor
Children’s Mission Bury,
and the Queen’s Jubilee
Nursing Fund Bury;
and, of course, the
Central Co-operation
Union fund.
The amounts of
money are modest
but significant. For
example, £116 was
paid to hospitals by the
Bury Society in 1905,
probably equivalent to
about £10,000 today. The total amount paid to
charities by the north-west section of co-operative
societies that year was £16,975.
Such payments were generally approved by
members meetings and came out of surplus before
distributions were made to members as a dividend
on purchases. The model rules for retail societies
provided that after paying for the expenses of the
business and interest on shares, a specified amount
(commonly 2.5%) was to be applied for educational
purposes, other sums for provident purposes
permitted by the laws applying to Friendly
Societies, and after that the remainder was to be
paid to members as a dividend on purchases.
While co-operative societies were a self-help
mechanism to enable individuals to meet their
immediate needs (in this context access to basic
provisions), their purpose was always wider than
just the economic interest of the members.
The constitution of the Rochdale Society of
Equitable Pioneers (the “Law First”) clearly states
that the underlying purpose was to improve
the financial, social and living conditions of its
members. The shop was part of this, but so was
providing work, employment, housing and indeed
establishing a new society served by enterprise.
So supporting local institutions like hospitals,
and other charitable causes which may not
bring obvious benefits to the locality (the Bury
society’s regular support to the RNLI being a good
38 | DECEMBER 2017